Religious group seeks New Orleans City Council support of smaller jail

Nearly 50 New Orleans religious leaders signed a joint letter to City Council members this week, asking that they vote in favor of a 1,438-bed jail.

The interfaith group of leaders noted that "every day" their congregants lose jobs and housing because of the justice system's historical inefficiencies and reliance upon incarceration. "We want a city jail that is no larger than is needed and one that will be used only to incarcerate those persons who pose a true risk to the safety of community," said the letter.

"Eighty percent of those in our city's jail have not been convicted of any crime - they simply wait in jail longer than detainees in any city in the country for their day in court," the leaders wrote. "Such over-incarceration, and the unjust and inefficient arrests crime policies that have fed it would not have been possible without an oversized jail."

The letter, quoting the biblical book of Matthew in its closing, also commended the mayor's working group, which recommended last year that a 1,438-bed jail should be built to serve as a stand-alone facility.

The council is expected to vote tomorrow on an ordinance authorizing construction of a new jail.

"As religious leaders who 'hunger and thirst for justice,' we implore that the process be honored and its recommendations be followed," wrote the leaders, who included Sr. Helen Prejean, Rabbi Edward Paul Cohn of Temple Sinai, the Rev. Tony Rigoli of Our Lady of Guadalupe Church, Sr. Clarita Bourque of the Marianite Bywater Project, Imam Omar Suleiman of Masjid Abu Bakr al-Siddique, the Rev. Douglas Doussan of St. Gabriel the Archangel Church, the Rev. Fred Kammer, head of the Jesuit Social Research Institute and a former head of Catholic Charities USA, and Imam Rafeeq Nu'man of Masjidur-Raheem.